Shuli Ren, Columnist

Beware Cap-in-Hand Xi

What's the point of building a safe house when the government can chip away at it?
Photographer: Johannes Eisele/Getty Images
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There are many things to like about China Life Insurance Co., but helping President Xi Jinping build a new aircraft carrierBloomberg Terminal isn't one of them.

Under the guise of state-owned-enterprise reform, China Shipbuilding Industry Co. said on FridayBloomberg Terminal it plans to buy the stakes it doesn't already own in two subsidiaries via a 22 billion yuan ($3.3 billion) share swap. The transaction will bring in bad-debt manager China Cinda Asset Management Co. and China Life as investors, the latter subscribing for 2 billion yuan of stock in shipbuilding units in Dalian and Wuhan.